to the grated window, to see whence his pleasure

came.

The Emir had a daughter, fair as the clouds of the morning, and she it was who sang for the lonely captive. She had seen him when he knew not, and love gently filled her heart.

No wonder that she came near to the barred window-no wonder that love-words were spoken, and loving tokens exchanged, for the knight had worshipped his unseen soother, and thought her an angel of light sent to comfort him in his misery. And who could look upon a face like his and not be moved! He might well look noble, for the blood of Alfred flushed on that manly brow! And yet at first she thought it pity.

Months rolled on, and the prisoner almost loved the cell where such sweet things were spoken.

At length a plan was formed, and they fled from the place together, and a short month found them at Rome; short, for joy indeed was there: but oh! how long, they were not married yet! and the maiden lay on her death-bed. Her plighted husband watched and whispered rough words of religion; and the priest was there with the cross, for the fairest daughter of Allah now leant on the cursed tree; she believed in a Saviour's love.

And then the marriage was made on earth, so they would be one in heaven; for she knew she

could not live. The ring was placed on her hand, and the maiden wife was gone, leaving her husband behind.

For months he seemed amazed, each day wiped away a hope, and still he could not think that she had left him. And so he hung around her tomb, stunned by his blighted love.

The fathers let him mourn, for they too mourned his loss, and gently, in time, they taught him to look to that heaven where she had but gone before, and waited for him to arrive.

And so the years sped on, and people ceased to notice the poor pilgrim who so often lingered in the lonely church.

Many tongues told the glorious deeds Richard was performing, how mightily he fought in Normandy; and the pilgrim's eye grew bright, but he could not leave the place where all his joys were set. At last came a Norman who sang that the arrow was making in Limousin by which King Richard should be slain. This was early in 1199 and the next day the pilgrim was

gone.

It was a weary journey home, for it had to be done on foot; and still there was much to perform when he heard of his sovereign's death.

The spell was broken which had bound him so

long to his woe, so he went on, and his reverence for Richard was still continued to John.

By the end of May he was again in England. He heard of disaffection, and many abused their king; but de Geresbroke heeded not, he loved him for his brother's sake. So changing his pilgrim's garb, he went to the sovereign's court. They knew the Angry Bear, and welcomed him home from his trials; and John was rejoiced to to see one whose arm would be useful.

At

The assemblage of knights was small, and they looked coldly on their king, and De Geresbroke flushed with anger when he thought how changed it was to the noble Richard's court-for all men loved him, and those who did not, feared. last came one whose language and look were insulting to the king. Trembling with rage, De Geresbroke strode across the hall: with mailed hand he struck the offender down, and when the attendants raised him, he was dead!

It was a great offence, and severely punished by the law thus to strike in the royal presence, and so the king called out in his Norman French, to "muzzle the bear."

But he was soon again set at liberty, as John would but seemingly punish such zeal for himself.

VOL I.

H

The Angry Bear did not live to reap his favour -he died shortly afterwards, probably before 1200; some said by poison from the enmity of the dead man's friends, but others thought he did but go to join his maiden wife. However that may be, his name still lives, for ever after, his descendants, in remembrance of that deed, have borne as their badge, a muzzle on the angry bear.

The unfortunate loss of papers has deprived the Grazebrook family of the name of this noble knight. In narrating the legend he is called the "Angry Bear" and "The Lord of Geresbroke " (i. e. Lord of the Manor of Geresbroke), but his position in the pedigree was; son of Roger de de Gresebrok, and great uncle to Bartholomew de Gresebrok, who left their original manor, and was the first who resided at Greysbrooke Hall.

The present Michael Grazebrook, Esq., of Audnam, co. Stafford, being nineteenth in lineal descent from Bartholomew de Gresebrok, is thus twenty-first in collateral descent from the Angry Bear.

147

THE WYNYARD GHOST STORY.

THERE ever has been, and probably ever will be, an irreconciliable feud between human reason and human testimony in the matter of the supernatural. All reason is decidedly opposed to the reality of apparitions, but it is no less certain that there are many tales of such things supported by as clear and strong evidence as ever was produced in a court of justice to convict or acquit a prisoner. Of this kind is our present story, which can be solved only in one of four ways: Either we must suppose that two high-minded and gallant officers concocted a childish falsehood, for which they had no possible inducement; or secondly, that they were the dupes of a trick played upon them by their brother officers; or thirdly, that they did actually see what they fancied they saw; which would at once establish the possibility of supernatural appearances, and